Stephen Mejias

In a few moments, I'll send the latest batch of Recommended Components blurbs to our copy editor, Richard Lehnert, the man of many words.

Speaking of words, this latest batch of blurbs features 8,085 of them. Words, that is. I always like to do a word-count on a finished RecCom file. In fact, not only do I perform a word-count after completing the entire project, I perform a word-count on each individual entry upon its specific completion. I don't know why. It's as if the number of words has something to do with the quality of the work. I give myself silent praise each time I come close to hitting 100 words with an individual entry.

"Wow," I say to myself, "you're awesome."

And when I go too far over 100 words, I edit; I splice, I nip, I tuck, I grab a hold of the poor, overstuffed blurb and stretch it tight, almost until it snaps, like an equalizer trimming the fat from bloated bass. [That simile is for you and you alone, Kal Rubinson, lover of equalization.] And yet. Each edition gets longer and longer, despite my efforts at concision. I think I did very well this time around, actually. The construction went smoother and faster than ever. So smooth and fast, in fact, I'm afraid I did a bad job.

"You're a master at this."

In any case. Eight thousand eighty-five words. None of them mine. I imagine a day when every single word of every single blurb in our entire Recommended Components list had to have been touched by my hand to arrive there.

What kind of a gross thought is that?

"Send the file to Richard, and go home."